


Umbrellas and Identities

by halcyyonn



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: F/M, Gen, Identity Reveal, Reveal, adrien connects the dots, not super relationship focused
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-30
Updated: 2020-12-30
Packaged: 2021-03-11 05:35:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,128
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28419957
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/halcyyonn/pseuds/halcyyonn
Summary: Already having a rough day, Adrien decides to spend some time as Chat Noir, only to be caught in the rain. He runs into Ladybug, but the umbrella she gave him seems weirdly familiar.
Relationships: Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir/Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug
Comments: 10
Kudos: 99
Collections: Miraculous Writer's Guild Blog Requests





	Umbrellas and Identities

**Author's Note:**

> This was written as a request for the ML Writer's Guild on Tumblr, and I know it's probably been done a hundred times before but I had fun writing. Enjoy!

When Adrien had given Marinette his umbrella on his first day at school, he certainly hadn’t expected it to be handed back to him months later by Ladybug of all people. Of course, he hadn’t realised it was the same umbrella until he was at home, staring at the practical black umbrella material, wondering why it seemed so familiar. Then he looked at the base of the handle and everything clicked together. 

The umbrella he was holding was Gabriel Agreste branded, with the familiar logo and everything. It was one of the few prototypes made during testing, and his father hadn’t been happy when he returned from school without it after just a single day. But that didn’t matter in the face of the new information he had just discovered. 

Marinette was Ladybug. And all it took for him to realise that in the end was an umbrella. 

Discovering Ladybug’s identity hadn’t been his intention when he went on patrol earlier that afternoon, nor had his intentions to have been caught in the rain. He had just been trying to get out of the house after Gabriel had promised to eat lunch with him and then didn’t show, only condescending to send a note with Nathalie after Adrien had waited for an hour. Which, to be fair, wasn’t exactly out of the ordinary for Gabriel. This time it just hurt much more.

Not quite knowing how to process his emotions, Adrien had returned to his room and transformed into Chat Noir. It only took him a few seconds to be out his window and leaping over Paris, letting the wind pushing past him take all the negative emotions that had been swirling around inside him. Today had been a bad day for Adrien, but for Chat Noir, he was just as free and unbothered as usual. 

He knew that Chat Noir and Adrien Agreste were the same people, but sometimes it was easier to just pretend they were completely separate. Especially on days like today when he just needed a break from the everyday Adrien Agreste the famous model lifestyle. 

And that desire to escape his normal life meant that he didn’t even spare a glance for the darkening edges of the sky. Rain was coming, and from the looks of the clouds, there was going to be a lot of it. But Chat didn’t know that until there was water bucketing down on top of him. And that meant it was too late to get back under any kind of cover before his hair was soaked, the magical suit barely keeping water out. He managed to take refuge under the overhanging signs of the Dupain-Cheng Bakery, but by that point, he looked like he had just crawled out of the ocean. 

From this point, he only had two choices; either he could wait out the rain (which didn’t look like it would be ending anytime too soon), or he could rush home in the rain and run the risk that he was caught out by his hair. Neither option was great, but they were the only ones Chat could think of in that moment. The cold from the rain was starting to seep through his suit and into his skin, and his hair was already getting stuck to his face and mask. It was getting irritating. 

Then she had appeared. Ladybug. Carrying an umbrella. Carrying his umbrella. Not that he knew it upon first glance, because a lot of umbrellas are the same practical single-coloured black. He also hadn’t bothered to wonder how she found him, and why she had been out with an umbrella, but now it all made sense. She had probably seen him through the windows of the bakery she lived in. No wonder she didn’t mind him taking the umbrella home because she lived just upstairs. 

Now that he knew Ladybug’s secret identity, he was noticing a lot more things that probably would have slipped past him before. The hairstyle, the colour of her eyes, the way that Marinette spoke more and more like Ladybug confronting an akuma when she was facing down with Chloe, even the way that they both walked. It was all the same, or at the very least incredibly similar. He really had been oblivious, huh?

Another thing that was similar between Marinette with and without the suit was the way she motivated people. When she had ‘stumbled’ upon Chat, she had asked what was wrong. He had given her a few vague details, his civilian life wasn’t great, someone he had been waiting for had ditched him without any prior notice, this wasn’t the first time and he knew it wouldn’t be the last, keeping any too revealing details to himself. 

In response, she had given him a pep talk that sounded almost identical to something he had heard Marinette say to another of their classmates. Even if the words weren’t exactly the same, Chat could imagine Marinette saying them to him instead of Ladybug. Of course he could, what was he saying? He was hearing Marinette say those words, not just imagining her handing him an umbrella and telling him to be careful in the rain. 

There were so many clues, and he had missed them all. All it took for him to realise was Marinette being a little too kind and giving him an umbrella that wasn’t as common around Paris as it looked. 

Where did he go from here? They both knew their secret identities were supposed to remain exactly that; a secret. But he knew. Well, he was pretty sure he knew. Even if he didn’t being so convinced could be dangerous if he somehow let the secret slip. Hawk Moth could start targeting Marinette, her friends, and her family, and Chat wouldn’t be able to forgive himself if innocent civilians got hurt because of him.

He would have to keep his newfound knowledge secret until Hawk Moth was defeated. Only when it was safe would Chat tell Ladybug that he had worked out her secret identity and reveal his own. It was only fair, after all. But was this really a secret he could keep that long, possibly even indefinitely? When they had fought Timetagger, they found out there was going to be another Hawk Moth in the future. He would have to keep the secret until they were adults, and Chat worried he would slip up one day and put people in danger. 

No. He had to tell Ladybug that he thought he knew her identity, and then they could work it out together. They were partners, they were supposed to be in this together. Everything would be fine. After all, with Ladybug’s luck on their side, everything would work out perfectly.


End file.
